A mum who was forced to carry her stillborn daughter along a hospital corridor has claimed her baby might still be alive if hospital staff had listened to her. Abbie Holland went into preterm labour at 23 weeks and five days during her first pregnancy after suffering no previous complications. The then 20 year old, a hairdresser, from Kent, told how she woke to intense pain and her waters ‘popping’. But after being transferred from Medway Maritime Hospital, Abbie said medics at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital , the closest facility with a NICU cot suitable for a 23-week baby, said there was no chance of saving her. Now 37, the mum told told the Mirror : “I was told by a specialist, ‘The chances of a scrap like this surviving was minimal’, and that they would not intervene despite my will for them to help. “I was heartbroken. One to hear the small chance, and two hearing my baby referred to as something almost inhumane. There was no empathy or professionalism. “This was the first time I was told that my baby might not make it. I had been told at the previous hospital that her survival rate if born alive would be low, but that they would be transferring me to give her the best possible chance and me the best possible outcome for the labour.” Abbie claimed she was put into a side room where she began haemorrhaging from a placental abruption and was left for over 12 hours without any nurse checks, midwife checks or labour progression checks. She said: “I was in an awful lot of pain with contractions. I started bleeding heavily, and multiple times my mum went to get a nurse, and we were just told it was normal. “They kept insisting they would not do anything as they wanted to try and keep the baby in. Even when I began bleeding, they refused to do anything and did not check her heartbeat at any point during the 12 hours. “At one one point, I passed out. My mum went and found a student midwife who came in and tried to find a heartbeat, but couldn’t. “I was then moved to a delivery room where I was checked, and they said my baby was already trying to pass through (she was breech). They then did a scan, which confirmed there was no heartbeat, despite it being there and strong during my transfer. “I was then told I needed to deliver my daughter. There was no time to process what had happened.” Abbie’s daughter was stillborn in August 2008. She claims she then had to walk past other mums and their new babies, carrying her dead baby daughter, while “covered in blood”. She said: “They told me they would move me back off the delivery ward to a private room where I could spend time with my baby. I was asked to walk to the room, and I carried my daughter. I had my nightie on and my stockings on, but they were all covered in blood. “I walked along the corridor, and there was a lady being wheeled past me holding her newborn baby. There were other new mums in the side rooms with their babies sitting on their beds, just watching me walk past.” Abbie said her midwife later called to ask why she had missed her 24-week check and had not been informed of the tragedy. Abbie said: “I talked her through everything that happened, and she told me none of what happened was normal and encouraged me to pursue legal action for negligence. “Each time a nurse came into the room after I passed blood, they kept saying it was normal and ‘old blood’. “My community midwife looked at all my notes and said how my daughter was a very good size for her gestation and had she been born alive, she would have had a chance to live. “She didn’t say she definitely would have lived, but she said she would have stood a chance. She told me that the baby wouldn’t have stood a chance once the bleeding started, and when the placenta abruption happened, as it would have starved the baby of oxygen at that point. “She said generally this would have been the point they should have tried to deliver the baby, as not doing so caused her death.” A post-mortem was carried out on her baby, who she named Angel. She said: “There were no genetic defects, no abnormalities, no issues with the placenta. There was no reason she would have died in the womb. “My mum carries Factor V Leiden, and this is hereditary. After being tested, I was also found to be a carrier of the mutation and therefore, I was put on blood thinners as a precaution. It was later confirmed by haematology that this could have been the reason for the abruption and the pre-term labour.” The mum described her care as “absolutely disgusting”. She said: “I remember being scared but believing the staff were doing everything they should. I was very naive, being only 20 and my first baby. “Their lack of care and empathy mentally scarred me and caused my otherwise healthy daughter to die before delivery. Had they actually helped and let me deliver my daughter before the abruption, she would have been born alive and could have stood a chance. “There could have been more care and empathy for my situation. They could have explained things to me more, and still given me that respect as a patient that I wasn’t given. It was so hard to even get a nurse to come in and check on me. I was offered no pain relief during 23 hours of labour. I was treated so inhumanely.” Abbie said she made a complaint with Chelsea and Westminster Hospital and received a full apology from the staff involved. She said: “They apologised for referring to my baby as a scrap and asked if I would be happy for them to use my experience in teaching so that they can prevent it from ever happening again.” A spokesperson for Chelsea and Westminster Hospital said: 鈥淲e extend our sincere condolences to Ms Holland for the tragic loss of her daughter. We remain committed to learning from all patient experiences and have since taken steps to improve our maternity care.鈥 If you need support following the loss of a baby or young child, you can visit https://www.lullabytrust.org.uk/bereavement-support/ or call their bereavement support helpline: 0808 802 6868